Kaleidoscope
by Tastywheat
Summary: “…and this, this is one of our special cases,” said Dr. Kagami as he opened the door. A series of drabbles and ficlets on different theories of what Raitei really is. First one: The Insanity Plea.


**A/N**: Part one of a series of drabbles and ficlets on different theories of what Raitei really is. I was planning on doing 13 because I came up with the idea after reading Wallace Stevens' poem, "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird," but so far I only have 9 theories so we'll see how many I actually write.

Theory 1: The Insanity Plea

"…and this, this is one of our special cases," said Dr. Kagami as he opened the door. "He'll be one of the patients you'll be working with when you start on Monday."

Dr. Midou nodded in thanks and stepped into the fluorescently lit room with a bright smile on his face and said, "Hello, Ginji," to the brown-haired young man in sea green pajamas, who was sitting on the side of the bed facing the wall away from them. When there was no reaction, Dr. Midou maneuvered himself so that he was standing just to his new patient's side, and tried again.

"Hello, Ginji. My name is Dr. Midou and I will be your doctor from now on."

Still no response.

Dr. Kagami sighed. "If you'll look at his file," he said, handing his new colleague a thick folder, "you'll see that he is generally unresponsive to external stimuli and has been that way for a long time, ever since the police brought him to us when he was seven."

Dr. Midou raised an eyebrow and looked again at young man. "So he's been here for," glances at the coversheet, "ten years already?"

"Yes, and it looks like he'll be a lifer," replied Dr. Kagami.

"What his diagnosis?" Dr. Midou, adjusting his glasses and scanning the file.

"Multiple severe and chronic dissociative disorders resulting from severe post-traumatic stress syndrome. Specific disorders include dissociative identity disorder—"

"He's got multiple personality disorder?" asked Dr. Midou, flipping a few pages with a raised eyebrow.

"Yes, that's what the public calls it," answered Dr. Kagami, giving his colleague a look that said _but we use the technical term here_.

"What's his history?" asked Dr. Midou.

"Well, I haven't been working with him directly, but I do know that he was sent here by the courts. Terrible story, really," said Dr. Kagami, shaking his head. "The police found him wandering the streets in Shinjuku splattered with blood. He had no ID on him and so the only way we know his name is from his school. His teacher called in after seeing his photo on the news. Never did find his parents or their bodies and he wouldn't talk. No next of kin stepped forward to claim him, and it was obvious that he was deeply traumatized, so the court assigned him to this institution and he's been here ever since."

"Has he made any progress?" asked Dr. Midou, still flipping through the pages. "From this, it seems like he was starting to socialize more with the other patients before my predecessor left."

"Yes, Ginji was showing some improvement and occasionally responded to Dr. Teshimine and some of the other patients, but has since relapsed."

"Any reason why Dr. Teshimine left in the middle of the treatment, especially after finally achieving some success?"

"No, he never told me," said Dr. Kagami, looking reflective. "We actually did not work much together because as head doctor of the lower floor, I'm supposed to observe everything that goes on here, which means that I don't work closely with any single doctor."

"Mhm," replied Dr. Midou, still looking through the file. "But what was his progress shortly before Dr. Teshimine left?"

"Well, from the reports, I remember that he was showing modest improvement, especially in terms of socialization. Then there was an incident about five years ago between one of our patients in this wing, a girl named Lonfa, and several patients from the northern wing. It happened in the common room and while no one was injured, we had to move Lonfa up to another wing. She was one of the patients that Ginji was starting to respond to, so the change caused him to relapse back into an unresponsive state. Shortly thereafter, he started exhibiting signs of dissociative identity disorder, occasionally having short bouts of aggressive behavior around other patients and calling himself 'Raitei,' so we think that the trauma of losing contact with Lonfa caused his condition to compound."

"It probably didn't help that Dr. Teshimine later also left," grumbled Dr. Midou, just loudly enough for Dr. Kagami to hear and shift a bit uncomfortably.

"I cannot speak for Dr. Teshimine, but I'm sure he had valid reasons," said Dr. Kagami, quickly. "At any rate," he said, resuming his composure, "do you think you'll be able to work with Ginji, perhaps get him to come back from wherever he's escaping to?"

Dr. Midou looked over at his new patient, and smiled gently. The brown-haired boy was still staring at the wall, lost in whatever dream reality was happening in his head.

"Yes, I think I'll be able to get him back," he said.

* * *

**Endnote**: I am not a psychiatrist and I have never taken psychology, so I have no idea if the diagnosis is right, but this was the closest I could find on WebMD. Feel free to correct me. 


End file.
